Coronavirus: A Florida student is helping hundreds of fellow seniors be ‘adopted’

Monday

May 4, 2020 at 10:55 AM

Hundreds of Palm Beach County high schoolers are receiving support from strangers through the informal "adopt-a-senior" program spreading on social media.

Homebound and glum, separated from friends, Lake Worth High senior Niejah Telfort sees little to celebrate about the way she’s winding down her high school career in quarantine.

But in a largely cheerless time, her final weeks of studies have been brightened by a new personal cheerleader — an "adopter" she’s never met in person but now chats with every day.

Telfort is one of more than 600 Palm Beach County seniors receiving a morale boost and a financial assist from strangers through an informal "adopt-a-senior" program spreading rapidly on social media.

The effort is fueled locally by hundreds of adults who — saddened that this year’s seniors are missing out on so many rites of passage — have flocked to Facebook to "adopt" one, gifting them with school supplies, advice and words of encouragement.

It’s adults doing the adopting, but the architect of the local effort is a teenager herself: Ka’Nedria Boldin, a Royal Palm Beach High senior who started the local campaign on a lonely evening at home two weeks ago and watched it spread online like wildfire.

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"Everybody was so down and saying this is crazy, this is unfair," she said, "and I just wanted to build them up. I had no idea how big it would go."

The Facebook group she started April 19, "Adopt A Palm Beach County High School Senior," now has nearly 5,000 members. By Thursday, it had arranged the "adoptions" of more than 660 graduating seniors around the county, with more coming each day.

Boldin’s was hardly the first of the many "adopt-a-senior" campaigns to spring up around the country after the coronavirus pandemic closed campuses, but the rapid growth of her campaign has inspired new groups in other cities and counties.

No one is suggesting that the adoptions can take the place of the memory-forming events this year’s seniors are missing, from proms and graduations to campus farewells.

But Boldin’s campaign might be the largest grassroots effort so far to fill the void for thousands of Palm Beach County teens preparing to cross into adulthood in social isolation.

As she finishes up her final weeks of virtual schooling, the 18-year-old has taken on the equivalent of a full-time job, spending hours a day tracking successful "adoption" pairings, showering compliments on seniors who post in the group and fielding questions from would-be adopters and adoptees.

The idea came to her on the Saturday that would have been her senior prom. Instead of dancing the night away in a fancy dress, she found herself at home conversing online with classmates.

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"We were in a group chat and I was telling them how we should start a page to celebrate seniors," she said.

A senior tribute page she made on Instagram became popular with friends. But it was when she decided to create a Facebook group that the effort went viral.

"Literally from Sunday afternoon to Monday afternoon it started blowing up," she said. "It was so many people. When I started it I was not expecting thousands of people to join."

Reach out and engage

On any given day, the Facebook page is flooded with posts by seniors or their parents, introducing soon-to-be graduates with photos and summaries of their achievements and ambitions.

"This past year has been one of the hardest times for me," a G-Star School of the Arts senior wrote, explaining that her father had died and she had begun working full-time in addition to her studies to help her mother cover household costs.

"I have worked really hard these past years to get where I am today," she wrote.

Her post won her an adopter, was "liked" more than 90 times and drew dozens of messages of support and congratulations.

People wishing to adopt a senior message them on Facebook to get permission from the student and their parent. Then the student’s post is updated to alert others that an adopter has been found.

The adopters are not supposed to give seniors money, but they are asked to consider gifting them with books, dorm room supplies or something else to help them commence the next phase of their lives.

More important, Boldin said they reach out and engage the students, offering encouragement, advice or simply a listening ear.

"I just felt like us as seniors we really need encouragement," she said.

Some of the new relationships have quickly become powerful ones, she said. Some adopters seek out students with similar career interests or who have faced similar life challenges.

A woman who had her first child as a teenager sought out a senior who had recently become a mother.

"Now they’re super close," she said of some of the pairings. "They’re going to go out to dinner sometime. It’s just really affecting a lot of people."

‘Really cool’ having someone there for you

Telfort, the Lake Worth High senior, posted about herself in the Facebook group Tuesday after her teacher mentioned the campaign during an online class.

The 18-year-old Boynton Beach resident, who is headed to Florida Atlantic University in the fall and aspires to be a police detective, said she has adjusted to taking classes online but hasn’t seen her classmates in person since campuses closed March 13.

"We said goodbye thinking it wouldn’t be our last goodbye," she said.

Less than an hour after posting, she was adopted by a woman who operates a non-profit charity. They spoke on the phone. The woman asked her to send a list of supplies she needed for college.

"We’ve messaged each other every day just talking about random things," she said. "It’s really cool that you have someone there for you that you don’t even know."

Surprised by the program’s success, Boldin is trying to take it further. She’s making plans for a large picnic celebration at a county park sometime this summer, date to be determined.

And she’s collecting money for book vouchers to be raffled off at the party, between food and kickball games.

People have reached out to her from St. Lucie County, Hendry County, Tallahassee and as far away as Virginia and Kentucky about starting their own adopt-a-senior movements after seeing hers.

"I’m just happy it’s spreading," she said.

In the fall Boldin plans to attend a private university out of state if the pandemic subsides.

In the meantime, she’s making time for her own adopter, a female minister she now speaks with regularly as she prepares to depart high school for whatever awaits.